


[Deleted]

by Vulpesmellifera



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Canon-Compliant until it's Canon-Defiant, Danger, Don't copy to another site, Greg has a crush on Sherlock Holmes, Kidnapped Greg, Kidnapped John, M/M, POV Multiple, Pre-Slash, Rescue, Trapped, no tfp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-05-25
Packaged: 2020-03-14 16:41:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18951967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vulpesmellifera/pseuds/Vulpesmellifera
Summary: Greg Lestrade and John Watson awake to find themselves locked in an unfinished basement. While they are well acquainted with one another, the two men aren't friends. But, the darkness has ways of bringing people closer together.Meanwhile, Sherlock and Sally must work together to solve the case of a missing John Watson.They're running out of time.





	[Deleted]

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bwblack](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bwblack/gifts).



> Thank you to [ReynardinePttr](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReynardinePotter/pseuds/ReynardinePotter) for her truly helpful and very last minute (my fault) work as a beta.

The darkness suffocates, like swaths of burial shroud draped about a corpse.

Greg tries not to think of corpses, especially the walking kind that might rise up from a basement floor. “I’d kill for a light right now.”

There’s rustling to his right, and then the LED glow of the cell phone screen illuminates the opposite wall of stones and a single metal bed frame with a moth-eaten mattress.

“I meant a light, as in a lighter,” Greg mumbles as the thirst for a fag sits at the back of his throat.

“Sorry,” John says as he turns the light off, plunging them into blackness once more. “Stupid of me.” They’d agreed to turn his phone off, though he doesn’t get service in this basement. Greg’s phone is back in his flat.

“Don’t suppose a doctor would carry one,” Greg says as he feels the cold sweat on his back gather once more. The basement is chilly, but the sweat isn’t due to temperature. He squeezes his eyes shut. His brain is still fogged from the drug, and his grasp on the situation is fragile.

“You’d be surprised at just how many doctors and nurses have taken up the habit,” comes the quiet response.

“Huh.”

“I thought you’d quit anyway. Don’t you and Sherlock have some kind of competition going?”

“Solidarity, more like.” He leans his head against the stone behind him. The dirt floor is doing nothing comfortable for his arse. The stale air they’ve been breathing for hours is heavy in his lungs.

A moment passes. Greg struggles to say something to John, something to sustain any kind of conversation, but he never really knew what to say to the man. They talked about Sherlock or football when they had a moment at crime scenes. John’s nice enough, but Greg doesn’t like to think of the doctor too hard.

His clearest memories of John aren’t too complimentary. There’s that of Sherlock’s funeral. John was thin and grey-faced, stoic as he stood next to Mrs. Hudson. And then when he’d seen him at Tesco after Mary’s death, pushing a cart with Rosie in it. Bumbling along like an old man, giving one word answers to the burbling of the baby in the carseat.

Now, he and Sherlock were back, large and in charge, vibrant with life, though neither seemed unscathed from recent experiences. He knows bits and pieces about things that have happened, but never the whole picture.

“I can’t believe this. It’s my first case with Sherlock in... _months_. And I get bloody kidnapped.”

“You two never did things by halves.” Greg hates to apply the phrase “you two” in this case, but the ache is old and somewhat subdued by now. Resigned to watching Sherlock faff off with John, always John. He stretches, his back feeling bruised after lying on the hard-packed dirt floor for who the fuck knows how long by now.

_Hopefully whatever the fuck drug it was that knocked me out won’t be too damaging in the long run._

Though, it would be nice if it had knocked him out for longer, so that he didn’t have to face the darkness, and what can hide there.

What can hide there.

John’s picked up the thread of conversation. “Yeah, it’s always extremes with him.” He doesn’t sound too pleased.

“By your blog posts, you used to love it.” _Trouble in paradise, still?_ Of course, the dynamic duo hasn’t been the same since the Fall. Anyone could see that Sherlock was bewildered by the idea that someone missed him, having miscalculated the extent of John’s grief.

And everyone else’s.

“I did. And I want to - again.” John breathes out. “But sometimes I wonder if that ship has passed.”

“Oh.” Greg tries to think of something to say. Anything that will keep the darkness at bay.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Sherlock rubs his thumbs against the tips of his fingers, his eyes scanning the case board. A photograph of Carmine Cook, light-skinned with greasy ginger hair and brown eyes, stares back at him. There’s a cleft to his upper lip that seemingly gives him a look of contempt. Only yesterday, Sherlock had given Sally Donovan the idea to look into Cook’s sister’s account books from a flower shop she owns in Camden Town. Georgina Cook was none too pleased to have to hand her paperwork over to police. It won’t be long until the noose narrows around Carmine Cook’s fat neck.

The creche called two hours ago and reported that repeated phone calls to John Watson went straight to voicemail. “She should have been picked up forty-five minutes ago,” the woman said in a nasally voice. Sherlock had unfolded his body from the sofa, divested himself of his dressing gown, and called the police as he headed out to pick up Rosie. Harry met him at the station, and took Rosie to her place.

“You find him, Sherlock,” Harry said as she left, Rosie pulling at Harry’s curls, unaware of the growing panic around her.

Sherlock looks again at the photo of Cook. He’s a small-time criminal with big-time dreams. All they need to book him is evidence, and Sherlock had given them just enough evidence to start the operation to bring him down.

There is no doubt in Sherlock’s mind that Cook is behind John’s abduction.

“Mycroft’s lackeys saw John being taken in broad daylight on CCTV.”

“How do we know it’s Cook? You tend to piss off most people.”

Sherlock narrows his eyes at Sally Donovan. “We don’t, but it is the most probable scenario.”

“We’ve got Cook and his known associates under what surveillance we can spare. No one’s moving.”

“He’s hired someone, then.” Sherlock cracks his knuckles and flexes his fingers, his mind whirring through possibilities. _The sister’s son? A new hire they haven’t seen yet? A silent partner?_

“I’ve got constables interviewing witnesses on the street. No one saw anything.”

“Idiots.”

“Oi. Those are our idiots.”

“Not the constables, though be assured they are also idiots. These so-called witnesses. Most people go throughout their day without seeing what’s around them, without really observing. Idiots.”

Donovan rolls her eyes. “People do the best they can.”

“It’s not good enough!” Sherlock snaps, his long, pale hand cutting through the air.

“Hey! I don’t have to put up with this. I’ll call Lestrade in, shall I?”

“You haven’t already called him?” Sherlock whirled, the coat flaring in his wake. “He’s the brightest of the lot of you, and I can depend on him to keep at it until the job’s done!”

“It’s his holiday, Sherlock! The man deserves some peace!”

“From what? It’s not as though the criminal class is particularly taxing as of late.”

“What you call this, then?”

Sherlock stills. She has him there.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Memories trickle into Greg’s head as the two men subside into silence. When he was a child, a tall, wraith-like man came out of his closet and stalked toward his bed. Greg screamed, and the hall light came on and his parents through the door. Nothing was there.

He begged his parents for a night light, but Dad thought it best to toughen him up. Mum would leave the hall light on and Greg’s door ajar. Over time, the Shadow Man visited again and again, lingering in his peripheral vision. Greg learned to be quiet, to count, to tell himself stories, to screw his eyes shut and hide under the blanket until the safety of sleep overcame him.

In the morning, Greg would find something out of place. The clock on his nightstand would face the other direction. A hat hanging from a hook would be on the ground. The chair at his desk would be on its side.

Greg hates the dark. He needs John to keep talking.

“Well, at any rate, he’ll notice your absence, so there’s some hope they’ll find us.” Greg sniffs and wraps his arms tighter about himself.

“What? Why? We didn’t have plans or anything like that.” John’s words are slow, not as slurred as they were a little bit ago, but still off.

“No dinner and a movie, then?” Greg tosses out.

“What? Christ, Greg, we’re not dating.” Greg hears John shift, his jacket - _at least he has a jacket_ \- brushing up against the stones of the wall. “Do people still think that? I got married to a woman.”

“Jesus, John, no one’s accusing you of anything. Can’t two blokes get together for dinner and a movie without it being a date?” Greg says. “Also, getting married to a woman doesn’t mean anything. Hell, I was married to a woman.”

_Shit._

“Um, yeah, you were.” John’s voice is curious and cautious. “Tryin’ to tell me something, Greg?”

“Does it matter?” Greg growls. “You don’t exactly seem the welcoming type, y’know.”

A pause. Then, “It’s none of my business. And it’s fine, you know.”

“I know it’s fine.”

John giggles, almost shrill.

“What’s so funny?”

“You. You remind me of him,” John laughs again. “The first night we had dinner together, I asked him if he had a girlfriend. He said ‘it’s not his area.’ Then I asked about a boyfriend, said it would be fine, and he said ‘I know it’s fine.’” John chuckles, then sighs. “What a night that was, trying to get to know someone as prickly as him.”

“You’re kinda prickly yourself, John. I think it’s why you two fit so well together.” Greg coughs into his fist, wondering if John can hear the thin blade of jealousy in his voice.

“Yeah,” John says, and he sounds a bit wistful. Greg wishes he could see John’s face. Then he hears the man clear his throat.

“So, um…”

Greg heaves a sigh. He should have know he wasn’t going to get off that easy.

“Been on any dates, lately? Men or women, of course.”

Greg snorts. “Like I’ve got time for that nonsense. I’m almost fifty. I’ve been married fifteen years, and you already know that didn’t work out well. I’ve got middle age spread weighing me down and a nicotine habit keeping me up. I’m putting my stepkid through college, and my daughter’s barely speaking to me.”

“C’mon, Greg, you’re a good lookin’ bloke.”

“Steady, John, you don’t want to sound too gay.”

John sighs like he carries some heavy burdens. “Did you know my sister’s gay? Got married once, too.”

“Everyone’s got a family member who’s gay. Doesn’t make you an ally, now, does it?” Greg can just imagine the facial expressions John must be making now, frowning, then pursing his lips, nodding to himself when he’s coming to a decision - _oh, and there’s that sniff he does when he’s getting riled about somethin_ g. He’s been watching John Watson for years, trying to figure out what it is that Sherlock sees in him.

“I don’t mind what Harry does. It’s her business, not mine.” Greg can imagine the muscle in John’s jaw tightening. “If anyone seems to have a problem here, I’d say it was you.”

_Yeah, but it’s not what you think._

“Don’t mind me, John.” Greg’s cheeks flush with shame. It’s not John’s fault that Greg is jealous. Apparently he can only keep up appearances for so long while recovering from being drugged and left in the dark. “I’m just grumpin’ out. My arse is sore and I can’t see a goddamn thing in here.”

They’d spent a good half hour feeling around the basement - an unfinished basement with a low ceiling made of heavy old oak floorboards and crossbeams. The walls are stone, and the floor hard packed soil. The bed frame has a stained mattress. Neither man wants to touch it. Metal bilco doors are locked on the outside. John’s phone doesn’t get any signal. No one has answered their shouts.

Greg snorts out a laugh.

“What?”

“Locked room. No way out. Now we just need a murder.”

“Don’t go getting any ideas.”

“Ha.” Then, “What did Sherlock say about having a boyfriend?”

“Huh? Oh. Can’t really recall. I think he just said ‘no.’” John shifts again, the noises reminding Greg of the skittering of insects. His nephew keeps crickets to feed his pet lizard. When there are tens of crickets inside one little space, they make a lot of noise - the sounds of a couple hundred tiny legs brushing against the objects around them. A creepy sensation crawls up his neck and he squirms. Closes his eyes again.

“I’m not sure he’s ever had a boyfriend or girlfriend. I mean, he seemed turned about by Irene Adler, but - “

“The dominatrix?”

“You know about her, then?”

“Mycroft had a bit of a meltdown over that whole debacle.”

“You hang out a lot with Mycroft?” It sounds like an accusation.

“Well, I wouldn’t say a lot. We don’t exactly run in the same circles. We talk time to time, and though he’s a bit of an arse, I like him.”

John chuckles. “Only you, Greg. I think the guy’s a right bastard.”

Greg laughs, feeling the darkness abate. “Oh, I know. Mycroft can be a bastard, but he’s got his heart in the right place, and at the end of the day, that’s what matters, isn’t it?”

“Sure,” John scoffs.

  
  


* * *

  
  


“We know Cook has four properties in the warehouse district.” Donovan points to the inked circles on the map. “They’re large buildings - “

“And if you go in with sirens wailing, they’ll know we’re coming,” Sherlock says as klaxons of panic are sounding in his own head. He squashes them down as he paces.

Donovan scowls as she throws down her pen. “No shit, Sherlock. But we can’t trespass, either.” She slams her fist on the map. “We’ve got to have probable cause, or we don’t go at all.”

Sherlock snarls in disgust and turns his back to her.

  
  


* * *

  
  


The smell of sulphur enters Greg’s nose, and it feels as if the hairs in his nose are curling with the acrid odor. He opens an eye, and shuts it. The memory of sitting on his childhood bed, the matches in hand and the candle at his bedside, flits through his mind. He kept lighting those matches to light the candle, chasing away the Shadow Man each time a match flared to life. Before he could light the candle, the flame would flicker and go out. Again, and again, until he’d run out of matches and the candle remained unlit and his bedroom stayed dark and cold. The Shadow Man stood by the closet, a fearsome figure in the pool of darkness there.

“Fucking Mycroft,” John’s grumble shocks Greg from his memory. _Fucking Mycroft? What?_

Greg wonders - does John understand the Holmes brothers at all? _He did use to worship the ground where Sherlock stood._ Maybe that’s it. John’s always seen them through one lens or another, and that lens always seemed a bit askew.

Well, no use thinking about it. _Better to just make nice._ Keep the monsters in the dark at bay. With his eyes closed, he won’t see the Shadow Man. _It’s been years._

_Quick. Think of something else._

“How’s Rosie?”

“She’s well,” John says. “Sherlock’s her emergency contact for the creche, so he’ll get her for me.” Greg hears him startle. “Oh! That’s how he’ll know I’m gone! They’ll call him once they can’t get a hold of me!”

_How did he not think of that earlier? His daughter was going to have to get picked up after all._

To be fair, they’ve been a little befuddled by the drugs.

“Brilliant, mate,” he says. “How long d’you think it’s been?”

He can hear John move. “Let me check my phone. I’d say we’ve been sitting here for over an hour now.”

Greg stares off in the gloom, the blackness reminding him of tar, making him think again of cigarettes. He tries to ignore the warping of the shadows into frightening silhouettes of half-remembered fears. The phone comes to life and casts half of John’s face into startling brilliance, wrinkles like a topographical map of the moors. “Near 8 pm. They’ve gotta be looking for us, now.”

The last thing Greg sees is John glancing up at him as he powers the phone off. An image of his face, turned spectral and fading, hangs against the darkness before him.

“Hey, isn’t it a work day for you?”

Greg’s heart is pounding. He’s awash with gratitude that John’s asking him something, distracting him from the tableau of horror threatening to eclipse his vision. “Nope. ‘M on holiday. Don’t have any plans with anyone, so as far as anyone knows, I’m sitting with my feet kicked up watchin’ the telly.”

“Damn.”

“You’re tellin’ me.” He shivers, wrapping his arms around his knees. “Gettin’ colder in here.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


“Greg isn’t answering his phone. Gone straight to voicemail.” Donovan shoves her phone back into her pocket. “Well, it’s just us, then.” But she doesn’t look quite convinced, her teeth worrying her lower lip.

Sherlock, his mouth a flat line, balls his hands in his pockets. “That’s not like Lestrade to not have his phone fully charged.”

Donovan meets his stare. “No. It isn’t.” She looks at a constable standing in the doorway. “Shit. Get a team to DI Lestrade’s flat right away!”

“I need to see his flat,” Sherlock announces.

“With me, then,” she says as she fishes car keys out of her pocket.

  
  


* * *

  
  


It’s working, this thing where he’s got John talking. The heaviness of the dark isn’t quite so suffocating. Greg closes his eyes and tries not to imagine a hand he wouldn’t see coming, fingers brushing against his cheek before he knows something aside from the two of them is there in the room.

“Greg, the thing about Sherlock is, sometimes, what’s even more important is what he doesn’t say,” John’s saying. “He omits things on purpose to control the narrative. He deletes information he considers below him.”

 _Like my name._ Well, didn’t that sting.

“One of those things he sees below him is romance. He says it’s a defect. He holds logic and reason above all things.” John says this with a mocking tone. “Told me he could not allow his great mind to be ruled by such a paltry and subsuming emotion such as love, couldn’t allow his transport to be diverted by lust, or some such nonsense.” John lets out a rush of air. “One of the mistakes I’ve made is assuming he didn’t feel things that way. Over time, I’ve come to think he does, and I think it affects him more than some people. I’ve been an absolute idiot, and I’ve been bad for him in more than one way.”

“John, he thinks the bloody sun rises and sets on you,” Greg replies, wondering where John’s rambling is heading. _Could be the drugs._

“I hit ‘im.”

“Hit him?”

“I mean, after Mary died. He was high and waving around this scalpel and I didn’t know Culverton Smith...I kicked him in his ribs and even Smith laughed. Smith was laughing while I beat a junkie into the floor.” Greg hears John swallow. He feels the chill that’s been permeating his body turn to stone, all of him ossifying with the cold knowledge of what one man can do to another. What family can do to one another.

“He let me do it. Because he thought he deserved it,” John says, his voice hoarse. “I told him as much.”

Every bone in Greg’s body wants to put John in handcuffs. Sherlock won’t press charges, though, and the evidence is likely long gone. Another part of him knows - what did Sally call it? Toxic masculinity? He knows this is toxic masculinity at its finest - men beating on other men so long as they weren’t beating on women or children.

The part of him that has always ached for Sherlock is angry and disgusted - with Sherlock. But, does Sherlock know any better? He goes back to John, treating John as if he were family, and it all happened right under his nose. _Does Mycroft know?_

“Greg?”

“I need a moment, John.”

John exhales. “I know what you mean. I’ve...I’ve never told anyone. Not even my therapist. I don’t even know why I’m tellin’ you. Except, people seem to think something about me that isn’t true. Shouldn’t be true.”

“He jumped for us, y’know. I saw the file. Mycroft let me have it the day he came back. Moriarty’s people needed to think he was dead, so they wouldn’t come after us. Me, you, and Mrs. Hudson were the targets.”

John scrabbles a bit in his seated position. “He acted like he was on a bloody world tour fighting the baddies.”

Greg holds his face with his hands. “He was caught and tortured, y’ know. Mycroft had to extract him. Personally.”

John makes a choked noise. “He bragged to me, Greg, like he was James Bond - “

“Because he wanted to impress you. He always wants to impress you. Since you’ve shown up, it’s been John, John, John. All the fucking time.”

“So?” John almost sounds a little pleased despite the seriousness of their argument.

“Jesus Christ, John. He dived off that building to save us.” Greg threw his arms out into the ink black air, wishing John could see his anger. Impotent without light, he increases the volume of his voice. “But you know, it could have just been you. He’d’ve jumped just to protect you, sod the rest of us.” He deflates. “Well, that’s not true, exactly, but he’d do anything for you.”

“Greg,” John’s voice sounds weary. “He still knows Anderson and Donovan’s first names, but he pretends to forget yours all the time.” He huffs, and his voice gets quieter. “He always said I see, but do not observe.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


“Team says no one answered the door.” Donovan steps in double time towards Lestrade’s building. “But I keep a spare key.”

Sherlock scoffs, tossing his head like a high-spirited horse. “Like I need a spare key.”

Donovan’s eyes flash toward him. “We’re doing this my way or you’re off this case.”

Sherlock glares. “As if you could stop me.”

“Don’t, Sherlock. For all we know, Greg’s just stepped out. He’s on holiday, y’know.”

“Without his phone? Never.” Sherlock stuffs his hands in his pockets, tucking his chin into the turned up collar of his Belstaff.

They push through the doors of his apartment building and head for the elevator.

Once inside the DI’s flat - Donovan having used her key while side-eying Sherlock - they locate his phone and his wallet. The phone is on the kitchen counter, next to a mug of half-drunk coffee, now cold. The wallet is on the coffee table in the lounge.

“Someone’s been here.” Sherlock’s eyes fly over the scene. He sniffs at the mug and considers taking a lick. Then, he thinks better of it. He holds it out to Donovan. “Have someone test this.” He eyes a spill on the counter. Greg might not have the neatest habits, but he’d have wiped that up. “Greg was drugged.”

“Detective Sergeant, ma’am?” A constable pokes his head in the door, no older than twenty-five with wide eyes and slicked back hair. Sherlock thinks he could be related to Greg, if his teeth were straighter and his eyes darker. He’s handsome, nonetheless, with a cleft chin and symmetrical features. “A neighbor says the DI was seen leaving the flat this morning with another man, and the whole thing was strange. The man said the DI was sick, and he was getting him to hospital. She offered to call 999, but he said it wasn’t that serious, and the DI just needed someone to look at him.”

“Idiots.” Sherlock nearly tosses the coffee mug at Donovan who catches it, trying to keep as much of the contents inside as possible. “Is there a description of the man who took him?”

“Cap over his face, but she said he was big, caucasian, taller than me, wearing a blue jersey. The DI looked like he was still in pyjamas, but he was wearing a trenchcoat over ’em.”

“Is there footage in this godforsaken building?” Sherlock says, the volume in his voice close to a bellow. The constable ducks back from the doorway.

“Sherlock!” Donovan barks. “Lay off. What else do you see? Anything?” She turns back to the door. “Davis! Get back in here!” The constable pops into the room, one hand in a fist while the other carries his notepad. “Put on your gloves and take the contents of this mug to get tested, stat.”

Sherlock registers their interaction on the backburner of his mind. His focus is on the impressions in the fibers of the carpeting. The DI kicks his shoes off by the door. Heavier steps mark the carpet. He could use John’s help on this. John could tell him what fast-acting drugs might make a man look ill or drunk, enough that they’d let someone else lead them out the door. Flunitrazepam? Seems the obvious choice. There, the hall closet. He opens the door and peers inside. The DI’s favored trenchcoat isn’t there. A windbreaker hangs next to a leather jacket - _smells heavenly_ \- which hangs next to a raincoat. The closet contains a slight hint of the detective inspector’s cheap cologne, a scent that reminds Sherlock of comfort and warmth and foggy days spent on the man’s sofa coming down from a high.

Only when the wife wasn’t home. Often when they were separated.

He pushes away the feelings that begin to bubble up. There’s no time for that. John is missing. Gr-Lestrade is missing. He needs his mind to function at the optimum level.

A pair of wellies and a pair of motorcycle boots, along with two brollies, litter the floor next to a vacuum. There’s just enough room for a person to stand here, and curiously, all the items on the floor are shoved to one side around the bottom of the vacuum, while the coats are spread evenly. There’s a bit of dried mud on the floor that could be from the boots, but on second glance the treads of the boot pairs are clean.

“Someone hid in this closet and waited for the drug to take effect.”

“How can you tell?” Donovan is looking around the room, eyes in a frantic search for clues. “The spill? What’s in the closet?”

Sherlock rolls his eyes. He takes out his phone and dials a number.

“ _Is the detective inspector also missing?”_

“Mycroft. You have eyes on Lestrade’s flat. What did you see?”

“ _Good heavens, Sherlock. Lost another?”_

“Don’t be obtuse,” Sherlock growls.

_“Hm. Well, it seems the detective inspector was helped into a slate gray sedan at 6:35 a.m. in front of his building.”_

“License plate?”

_“Obscured. Dent in left fender. Scratch on driver’s side door.”_

“Driver? Passengers?”

_“Of course there was a driver. Detective Inspector Lestrade and his escort appeared to be the only passengers. The escort was a caucasian male, roughly six feet tall, nearly 14 stone. He wore a cap and sunglasses. Off the rack clothes. Blue jersey and dungarees.”_

“Did you track the vehicle?”

_“It traveled north. I’m afraid, dear brother, that it took the A1 out of London.”_

Sherlock hangs up, his heart pounding and his fingers twitching.

“It’s not the warehouses.”

“What?”

“Cook might own those warehouses, but that’s not where we’ll find them.”

“Then where?” Her brown eyes snap to his and her lip curls.

“There must be something. Does Cook have any relatives, any properties, anything outside of town? A good friend? An associate? Give me something to work with! I need data!”

He paces. “Why would they take Lestrade? They may as well have taken you.”

“Thanks. He’s listed as the lead investigator on the case, even though he scheduled a holiday.”

“Unless - “ his eyes widen. He dials his phone again.

 _“Brother?”_ The bored tone is overdone.

“Have you checked on Mrs. Hudson?”

_“I have. She left yesterday in a taxi that took her to the train station. I have agents on the way to ensure she made it to her destination.”_

“Her sister again.”

_“Quite.”_

Sherlock hangs up.  He pauses, his stare penetrating the wall before him.

“What’s your theory?” Donovan says.

“John, Mrs. Hudson, Lestrade,” Sherlock says, memories of a rooftop and a gun and his hands in the air by the edge, a long, long way down the pavement, his brain dizzy with possibilities that were being swallowed up until there was only one, narrow, damning path before him.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Greg’s pulse pounds in his ears. There’s nothing else in the dark, is there? It stretches out before him, and he thinks he can hear the rattling of bones in the distance, the shaking of trees, a fathom of dread forming in his gut. _No, that breathing is John. There isn’t anyone else breathing, is there?_

_Will I see sunlight again?_

“Greg?”

“Yeah?”

“I been saying your name. You all right?”

“Yeah. I just - I just. Memories, that’s all.” Long fingers. A faceless horror.

_Christ. I need to get out._

“Did you hear what I said?”

“Yeah.”

“I mean, Sherlock deletes a lot of things. Anything he sees as below him.”

Greg rehearses the conversation in his head, and catches on to what John is implying.

“It doesn’t have to mean anything, John. I helped him through some really troubling times, is all. Probably doesn’t want to think of it, and he hates to be indebted to anyone.”

“Christ, I can’t believe I’m having this conversation. You like him, don’t you?”

“‘Course I do. He’s an arse, but he gets the job done.”

“More than that, Greg.” John’s voice is soft, coaxing.

Greg pauses. Its humiliating, this thing, these feelings. “It doesn’t matter, John. I made my peace with it a long time ago.”

“Apparently not.”

Greg thinks of something else to say. “Did you really hit him like that?”

“I - “ John inhales, and exhales. “He didn’t deserve it. Not really.”

“Mm.” Greg craves a cigarette again. If they get out of this alive, he’s going straight to the off-license for a bottle and a carton. “We got bigger problems right now, John. No one’s come to us, we don’t have food or water, your phone has zero signal, and I don’t know how anyone’s gonna find us.” _And the shadows are changing. Funny how there can be shadows in the pitch dark._

“Sherlock can do it.”

“Oh, you believe in him again, do you?”

“I never really stopped, Greg,” John says with an edge of anger in his voice.

“Sorry. I - I can’t seem to stop sniping at you.” Greg breathes out and rolls his head against the wall behind him. “I’m knackered. It’s gotta be getting late.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


Sherlock’s phone rings. He answers.

“ _Carmine Cook’s best friend from university is Kenneth McDermott. Mr. McDermott has an uncle with a house in Potten End. In the woods._ ” Mycroft says as if reading a boring piece of news. “ _Mr. Cook and Mr. McDermott spend time there each summer._ ”

“How do you know this?”

“ _Mr. McDermott has a blog. Mostly insipid navel-gazing, but he seems quite excited when his best friend joins him for their yearly fishing trips. The uncle is Paul Miller._ ”

Sherlock hangs up.

“Potten End,” Sherlock says to Donovan. “We need to find the property of Paul Miller in Potten End.”

“I don’t even know where that is!” Donovan threw her hands up. “Constable, look up Paul Miller. Let’s get in the car. We’ve got a possible location. We need to know Paul Miller’s property address in Potten End. Get on it!”

“This is a distraction.” Sherlock is teetering back and forth on his feet. “Cook has planned something. Keep your people on him and his gang.”

Donovan nodded. “We go after John and Greg.”

“Yes. Yes, we do.”

  


* * *

  
  


“You know, Greg, he doesn’t do relationships.”

Greg huffs. “Yeah. I know.”

“I just, I just hate to see you get hurt.”

Greg blows air through his lips in a pfft. “I don’t need your pity, John. His Nibs laid it out for me years ago.”

“What’s that?”

 _Well, I’ve already embarrassed myself; what’s more?_ “I told him, once. Me and Anne were separated. Thought we’d really get divorced that time.” Greg remembers it clear as sunshine. Sherlock was in his office, jabbering on about a cold case that Greg had handed him the day before. That spark, that energy that Sherlock espoused as he worked had Greg in a thrall, as it always did. Sherlock rubbed him the wrong way sometimes, but overall, Greg was dazzled by him.

Anne and he had been growing distant for years. Sherlock and he were working closely together, and Greg swore that Sherlock felt the tension, too.

“Anyway, I told him,” Greg squeezes his knees. “That I thought Anne and I would be divorcing. That this was our final separation. He listened, y’know? He didn’t care about anyone’s personal details. But, he listened to me when I talked about mine. That’s why...that’s why I sorta thought he felt what I was feeling.”

Greg releases one knee to rub the back of his neck. “What an idiot I was.”

John is silent. Not being able to see each other is comforting somehow. As if Greg could just speak all his secrets into the black air between them and then never burden him again. “And then I told him that I felt like we made a great team. Then I kissed him.”

“You what?” John shouts.

“Christ, John, I was in a confused place.” Greg’s heart stutters. “I was miserable. But here was this one person who was hitting all the right buttons for me - brilliant, and bloody gorgeous, and appreciative of my work, even if he’s an arse to my team.” Greg laughs. “I shocked him into silence. That’s one way to get ‘im to shut up.”

No answer from John.

“Anyway, he left. Abrupt. Said nothing,” Greg says. “The next time I saw him, I acted professionally. Asked him to come on a case. He told me not in the panda. First time for that. He never minded riding with me before.

“And then, there you were.” _He’s with me._ Sherlock’s voice echoes in Greg’s head. “That was the end of our partnership, and the start of yours.”

“But Sherlock - “ John’s voice sounds like he’s speaking around something in his throat. “Sherlock and I aren’t like that. Never have been.”

“Doesn’t matter. It’s not me he wants, if he was going to have anyone.”

A beat. Then, “D’you think he’s gay?”

Greg snorts with laughter. “Jesus, John, do you need me to draw you a map?”

“Well, I don’t really know, okay? It’s not like he’s said.”

A few moments pass without either saying anything. Greg thumps his head against the wall, thinking about lying down. “Well, that’s my sorry lot in life. But, y’know, I have dates now and again. It’s a bit of excitement, is all. Some pretty faces. Strong arms. Sometimes I get a leg over.”

“Sherlock has deduced your dates and told you when they’re...not the one.” Greg can imagine the quotation marks around ‘the one.’

“Yeah, because he’s a bastard. Probably thinks he’s being helpful.” He lies down on his side, and shivers as the cold from the floor leaches through his thin pyjamas. The mattress, disgusting as it looked in the mobile light, might not actually be a bad idea.

He tries to not think of a figure beside him, leaning over him with a macabre stare.  
  
  


 

* * *

  
  


“There’s a house in Potten End,” Donovan sounds amazed. “I don’t know how you do it. Who was on the phone?”

“Someone who owes me lots of favors.” Sherlock mumbles, typing on his phone.

“Well, I hope this pans out.” She’s quiet a moment before adding. “I’m afraid for Greg.”

Sherlock frowns, wondering how he’s supposed to respond. Is he afraid?

Yes. It’s there. A pulsating bubble, like a fluid-filled cyst, ever present and ready to make itself known as if it were to become a cancer. He pushes it away. “So long as you can do your job, I suppose fear is fine, or so I believe.”

Donovan scoffs. “You’re such an unbelievable arse.”

Sherlock almost smiles, except the situation isn’t funny. “We’re still a half hour out,” she’s saying. “Eyes on Cook say he’s not moved from his store.”

Sherlock blows out a breath and shifts his gaze to the window, watching the scenery pass. His left leg jiggles, and his fingers tap on his right knee. The jostling of the car over a bump brings him back to a memory.

_“Listen, we’ll just get you cleaned up. You can kip on the sofa. Anne’s not in.” He’s holding the wheel, glancing at Sherlock, brown eyes wide with worry._

_Sherlock squirms under that kind-hearted gaze. It’s too close. It evokes something soft and desperate in his chest. He pushes back. “Your wife left you again.”_

_“Yeah, she did, you berk.” The eyes shift back to the road, the disappointment palpable. Sherlock can breathe again._

His hair had been shot through with silver, not quite the shock of pewter it is now.

Sherlock pushes it all away, focusing instead on the landmarks they pass.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Greg’s side is aching and the cold is causing his body to shake.

“So, how’d you know you like men?”

Greg blows out a breath of air, his teeth starting to chatter. “I dunno. Same way you like women, probably. Just found men did it for me. Especially the tall ones.” _And I do have a thing for curls._ He pulls his knees closer to his chest, rubbing his arms with his hands.

“And your family was okay with it?”

“Shit, no. And it wasn’t safe, then, or at least, not as safe as it is today, though today isn’t safer in some respects.” Greg sighs. “I thought I could make it with Anne. A gay police officer? That wasn’t going to fly. But now I’m senior enough, and got a good enough close rate, that it doesn’t matter much anymore. And Anne’s not in the picture...but it’s hard to get out there. Dating scene isn’t what it used to be, and I don’t like to play daddy to some twink.”

John doesn’t say anything.

“What about you, John?”

“Uh, no,” He can hear John swallowing in the darkness. “When Harry came out, our house became World War 3. It was awful. She left.”

“That tells me about Harry. What about you?”

“I mean, it’s not like that - not like that for me.” John is shifting in the darkness. “I mean, I can tell when someone is attractive. Sherlock isn’t...he’s not like Daniel Craig, but he’s good looking. Very good looking. Have to be blind to miss it.”

“Daniel Craig, huh, John?” Greg finds himself smiling.

“Not like that!” John says. “I just mean...you know, he’s not all gorgeous male lead, but he’s…” John’s voice softens. “He’s got something about him.”

“You sound smitten,” Greg teases.

“It’s not for me. I’m...I’m fine with who I am.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I have to be.” John’s breathing is getting heavier.

“Okay, okay, John. Didn’t mean to pry.”

“It’s okay. I did the prying first.”

Greg sighs, scrubbing a hand through his hair, loathing the pain that’s been building in his shoulder and in his hip.

“Hey. D’you smell that?”

“Smell what?”

“It smells like...like smoke.”

Greg shoots up to sitting, a flash of memory: an unlit candle and the stench of sulphur hanging in the air.

  
  


* * *

  
  


They’re heading down a long ribbon of road that has turned to dirt. The stars have come out. Sherlock tries to ignore the thudding in his chest by counting the stars he can see, his head pressed to the cold glass of the passenger side window.

“What’s that glow up ahead?” Donovan says.

Sherlock whips his head around to look out the windshield. There’s an orange glow in the blue darkness. He rolls down the window. Smoke.

“Drive faster.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


“Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.” Greg and John are pressed up against one wall as embers rain down through the cracks of the old hardwood floor above them. Luckily smoke and hot air rise, but Greg knows this won’t last long. The fire seems to be headed toward them, and he hears the crackling of flames and the splintering of objects above them.

The glow between the floorboards is still no help in the darkness below. He can hear John’s measured breathing beside him, as if he were quelling his panic through breath alone. But Greg can’t help but think of the Shadow Man in the black beside them, a maniacal grin on his otherwise featureless face. After all these years.

There’s another thunderous crack and Greg can almost feel the structure shake above them. The stone at their back is digging into his ribs. _Will we survive this?_

“Jesus Christ, why does it have to be fire?” John is saying, his voice a little thin and high. Greg reaches out and grabs his arm. John’s hand closes over his grip. There are little bits of glowing embers on the ground, but the jet black darkness is barely pushed back. Feeling another person next to him makes him just strong enough to consider their next move.

“John, the bed. Let’s flip it against the wall and over us. We might get away from the embers burning us.”

John breathes out, shaky. “Yeah, okay.” He gets his phone out with the light on, and they head for the bed frame. They dodge falling embers and Greg wonders if this is any good kind of plan at all. Metal could get very hot in the fire, and hiding under a mattress is likely only delaying the inevitable.

_Don’t think about it._

_Focus._

_Don’t panic._

“Greg, I don’t know that -” The house rumbles like thunder and the reverb of a tremendous crack ripples through Greg’s body. Falling wood and fiery brands land beside him in a deafening crash. The outline of John Watson crumples to the ground.

“John!” Smoke fills the air as the heat becomes an oppressive thing, a moving monster of high temperature enveloping Greg in a fog of calefaction. In the yellow firelight he can see John’s body and beneath the sounds of crackling and snapping and crepitating, John moans. “John!” Greg falls to the ground beside John, and begins pulling him back from the burning wreckage of oak flooring. As best as he can tell, John is alive, but he isn’t trying to stand or hold himself up. As smoke tumbles around the room, Greg decides to pull John’s jacket off of him. He covers John’s head with it. He pulls off his own pyjama tee and hangs that over his head, even as a hot ember hits the soft flesh of his belly. The pain is scorching, but he holds on to John, and keeps them low to the ground. He’s inhales what little cool air is there, the musty odor of dirt a welcome difference to the blistering heat above it.

John groans. _We gotta get out of here._ The only way is up.

With his free hand he grabs the metal frame of the bed and tilts it up against the wall. As if moving in a nightmare, he can hear shouting, through the clapping of falling debris and popping of flames, the Shadow Man is calling his name.

_Move._

He wedges the lower end of the bed into the floor, giving thanks to some nameless thing that the floor is made of dirt rather than concrete as the legs stab into the ground. He slings John over one shoulder with a strength he was unaware of possessing. “Hold on!” John whines as he’s moved, and Greg makes the mistake of gulping breath, the air heavy with hot smoke and fumes. He grips the metal bars of the bed as his chest heaves with a hacking cough. His lungs burn with pain and his eyes water.

 _Climb._ He shifts John with one arm, feeling John’s hands clasp in the front of his chest. _Oh thank fucking god._ He begins to climb.

He looks up; he falters. The Shadow Man stands over them. His features are obscured by shade and smoke, his mouth and body cloaked in a dark shroud. His deep, rough voice barely registers in Greg’s ears as the floor continues to fall into the basement.

The Shadow Man reaches one long hand toward them, and Greg’s heart jackhammers as the heat begins to scald his skin and John moans again. _Escort to hell?_ Greg swallows, finding no moisture in his mouth for relief, and reaches up.

The Shadow Man’s grip is firm and slick. Greg closes his eyes as he and John are pulled up, his legs working to step up the bars of the bed frame, accepting his ascent into a childhood nightmare. Somehow he’s jostled through hellfires and finds himself coming into a shock of cold air. He gasps, his lungs contracting with agony. There’s a burst of lightheadedness, and he gasps again, feeling someone’s hands on his shoulders - _where has John gone_ \- and shaking him - _hugging him_ \- and the throbbing of his chest and the sting of heat on his skin is fading.

“John?” His voice cracks, and his throat twinges.

“He’s okay, Greg, Sherlock’s got him. Ambulance on the way,” Sally’s voice, panicked, is in his ear. _When did she get here?_

“Good god. Oh god.” He coughs. His head is woozy and he lets her guide him to the ground - _already on my knees, it’s not much further to lie down._

“Greg? Are you hurt anywhere?” Sally’s asking him. “Greg?”

“Tired.” It hurts to talk and it turns to pained coughing.

“It’s alright, it’ll be alright.” She’s rubbing his arm.

He can hear the fire, a bonfire of titanic proportions, flames screaming to reach him as he soaks up the cool night air, skin against the lush grass below him, a friend’s hand on him. Sherlock is here. John is here. He’s alive.

_The Shadow Man?_

He keeps his eyes shut in fear that the Shadow Man will be sitting beside him, unseen by anyone else.

“Greg, drink this.” Sally is trying to get him to sit up. _Sirens?_

He opens his eyes as she maneuvers him into sitting and the rim of a plastic bottle is pressed to his mouth, the cold water a startling surprise to his parched lips. He parts them and grips the bottle with one hand, feeling like a dying man in the desert, scared that maybe this is an ersatz oasis, the illusion of safety and comfort about to fade at any moment, leaving him inside a burning cage with his childhood night terror.

“Greg, take it easy.” Sally’s arm is around his shoulders and she’s sitting on the ground beside him. He opens his eyes to see the light of the emergency vehicles coming down a road. The shadows from the fire play on the trees before him, the burning house at his back.

“John?” He asks again, feeling a little foggy about how he’s ended up outside.

“He’s alright. The paramedics will see to him, and you.”

“How is Lestrade?” A familiar baritone sounds behind them.

“He’ll be alright. He doesn’t seem to have any injuries aside from smoke inhalation, and maybe some burns,” Sally says. “How’s John?”

“He’s breathing. He’s got a head wound.” Sherlock’s voice is wavering.

“I tried to save him,” Greg croaks.

“You did good, Greg,” Sally says and gives him a squeeze with her arm. “You’re out of the there and John’s out of there. You did fine.”

The lights flash and he closes his eyes as the vehicles drive up, the vibrations of their wheels carrying through the ground. _Thank god. Thank god._

  
  


* * *

  
  


Sherlock hovers over the paramedics as they lift John onto a stretcher, an oxygen mask over his face. His eyes are opening and he keeps looking at Sherlock and putting a hand on the mask as if he’s going to remove it.

“Please, Mr. Watson, you need oxygen,” the paramedic, a young man with scruffy dyed black hair and pocked skin, blocks John’s hand.

“That’s _Doctor_ Watson,” says Sherlock. He glances quickly over to the silver-haired man sitting on the back of the other ambulance, accepting oxygen and having burns tended to.

John finally manages to wrench the oxygen mask away from his face. “Sherlock,” he slurs with a voice that sounds like the scrape of broken glass over asphalt. “Remember - remember what I said.”

“John, relax. We can talk later.”

“No!” John grabs onto his sleeve. “I see...but I don’t observe...I got it now...Greg? Greg.”

“Greg? You mean Lestrade? He’s fine,” Sherlock glances at the DI and back to John. “You’re both fine.”

“No, _Greg_. You delete...you delete what you think is below you.” John inhales and it looks like it hurts. “It’s not below you. It won’t detract from who you are.” He inhales again. “Love. Love, I mean.”

Sherlock stills.

“Greg - told me.” John says, his voice raw. “He kissed you.”

Sherlock’s heart pounds as the memory of the kiss clouds his mind. Soft lips on his, a zip of desire shooting down his spine and into his groin, lust spooling in a place he tried to ignore -

“It’s okay.” John reaches out and pats his hand as if he were comforting Sherlock. “It’s all fine.”

The paramedic huffs as he pushes the mask into place, and John lets it happen. The stretcher is being lifted into the ambulance before Sherlock begins demanding that he be let aboard, too.

Sally is at his side in an instant, telling him to calm down, and that they’ll use her car to follow the ambulances back to the hospital.

The house isn’t salvageable, he registers as he gets into her vehicle. The fire fighters are hosing it down, and he’s loathe to think of the evidence that is in ruins, but the link from Mr. McDermott’s blog to Carmine Cook may be just enough for probable cause for a warrant to search Cook’s other properties, and gather enough additional evidence for a trial.  

John and Gre - _the inspector_ \- are safe, though, and that’s what matters. Now, there’s a puzzle to be solved.

How did they know to take Greg? He works with Gregson, Dimmock, and Hopkins just as often now.

“Sherlock, they’re bringing in a Kenneth McDermott. Seems Paul Miller passed away last month, and left the cabin to his nephew.” Sally settles into the driver’s seat, tucking her phone into her pocket.

“Check and see if he has a white Honda Civic.” He narrows his eyes at her. “It was the only car we passed on the road while heading to the property.”

Sally gets back onto the phone to relay the information. She hangs up just as the ambulances start to leave, her foot hitting the gas and staying close to the red taillights.

  


* * *

  


Greg leans back in the thinly cushioned chair of the waiting room. He’s signed himself out, the bandages over his burns already itching. Now, he waits, hoping to see Sherlock and find out what’s happening with John.

Sally holds out a bottle of water for him.

“Thanks, Sal.” He takes it and twists open the top. His voice is still growly, and his lungs still feel a little tight, but breathing has been getting easier as time passes.

“Thank the universe you got us out of there, Sal.” Greg shakes his head and takes a sip. “I was going crazy. Seeing things. Then there was that whole almost dying part.”

Sally’s watching him. “You gonna be okay?”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

Sally turns swivels her head to face the wall across from them. There’s a watercolor painting of flowers hung there. “If...if it hadn’t been for Sherlock, you might’ve died.” Her voice is soft and thick.

Greg looks at her. “What is it?”

“Your phone was turned off. Gone to voicemail.” She sighs. “I thought it’d be better to leave you alone, let you enjoy your holiday. Sherlock knew it wasn’t right. He _knew_ , and the moment he said it, I knew he was right. I just...hate when he’s right, and I was trying to ignore my own impulse telling me that something was wrong - “

Greg sets his hand on her arm. “Thank you for listening to Sherlock. I know it isn’t always easy.”

Sally’s answering smile is more of a grimace. “He was really worried about you, sir. I didn’t...I didn’t expect to see him care. He cares about the both of you.”

Greg’s chest aches with this. “Thanks for telling me.” He squeezes her arm.

“I’ve never seen someone react so quickly to a building on fire. He ran right in there - “

“What?” Greg startles.

Sally’s eyes are wide as she faces him. “Yeah, Greg. What do you mean, ‘what?’ You didn’t recognize him? It wasn't me.”

“Shit.” Greg starts laughing, and ends with a coughing fit that hurts his throat. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  
  


* * *

  


John is laying against the pillows, a nasal cannula in place for oxygen. He opens his eyes, and Sherlock nearly cringes to see how red they are. There’s a bandage on his head from where the board hit him, and Sherlock knows there are sterile gauzes covering burn blisters beneath the doctor’s hospital gown.

John gives a small smile in his direction and opens his mouth.

“No, don’t talk, John.” _Especially if you’re going to say all those ridiculous things you were saying earlier._ “They tell me you need to save your breath.” He winks at him.

John shakes his head, though the movement is slow and his forehead tenses.

“You’ve a mild concussion,” Sherlock says. “They’re treating you for second degree burns and smoke inhalation, as well.”

“Greg?” His voice is hoarse.

“The detective inspector has some mild burns, and received oxygen. He’s better off than you are.”

John’s eyes close.

 _It’s all fine,_ echoes in Sherlock’s head. The kiss - he blinks it away. It was inappropriate. Sherlock needed the work, and he couldn’t have the work on his own merit if he were _carousing_ with the lead detective.

_A married man._

_Not married, anymore, though._

_And you? Still married to your work?_ The voice in his head sounds an awful lot like John’s.

John had made it easy to give the detective inspector the brush off. John had been the perfect foil. And in the meantime, Sherlock gained something he never thought he would - a best friend.

“It’s all fine,” John startles Sherlock from his thoughts. “You should - you should do it.” John smiles at him from the pillow, somehow serene despite the crimson brightness of his eyes and the cannula up his nose. “You didn’t do so bad with a friend.”

Sherlock flicks his eyes up to meet John’s.

“I mean, we’ve been kind of shit friends, actually, but we worked it out.” John clears his throat. “Like you said. It is what it is.”

Sherlock nods, his mind flipping through memories of their acquaintance, a lab, a flat, the moors, inns, museums, St Barts, the Landmark, the church, the aquarium, the morgue floor, the hug… They’ve hurt each other, and saved each other, multiple times, again and again.

“Can I have ice?”

Sherlock lifts the cup of ice from the bedside and tips it to John’s mouth, allowing the crushed pieces to fall onto his tongue.

John leans back with a moan. “God, that’s good.”

Sherlock places the cup back on the bedside, and sits in his chair. “John, you seem under the impression that I lack for a companion. I do not, when I have you.”

John smiles. “I mean, a romantic companion, Sherlock.” His voice is a quiet rasp.

Sherlock stares at his lap. Aside from Moriarty’s threat on the rooftop, he’s never known the inspector to be in direct danger, despite the fact that his job is dangerous. It’s altered something inside of Sherlock. Made him reconsider his frame of view on life. Perhaps.

Or maybe it was watching the man carry John up the bed frame, heroic in the same way John is heroic, never giving up so long as he’s breathing and moving.

“The inspector would be very kind,” he admits.

“And he’d understand your need for the work. We can take more private cases, and cases with other DIs, if you’re worried about working with him.” He coughs again.

Sherlock thinks of Greg’s face when he pulled back from the kiss, a mixture of fear and longing. He’d never called or texted Sherlock after that, until there was another suspicious suicide. He’d acted so casual, so like himself, all business and pushy professionalism, just like always. But John was suggesting something else…

It’s been years. The man dates mostly women. The kiss was a mistake. It was working together in long hours, side by side, a tenuous sexual attraction built on mutual respect and close quarters.

But it hadn’t happened like that with John. Not even nights where they were drunk and uninhibited. Though Sherlock had wondered…

He hadn’t wanted. Not like he had with the married Lestrade.

“He was married to a woman.”

“Pfft. So?” John still sounds congested, but the doctor says that may not go away for days. “He’s carrying a torch for you, anyway. It’s nigh on pathetic, now.” He closes his eyes, but he’s smiling. “Ask him out. He’ll say yes, Sherlock.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


Sally’s looking knackered.

“Go home, Sal.”

“Only when you go home, sir.” She glances at one of the double wide chairs. “Though I might curl up there for a kip.”

Greg rolls his eyes, and lets his chin fall to his palm, crooking his elbow up on the wooden arm of his chair. John was in worst shape than him. Likely damage to his lungs, plus the board to his head.

He coughs.

“Released already, Lestrade?” Sherlock’s voice rolls across his eardrums. There’s the old pull of attraction in his solar plexus, blazing anew after all his talk earlier with John, despite the near brush with death.

Sally scowls beside him, as is her usual demeanour when Sherlock appears. “How’s John?”

“Resting. Mild concussion, minor airway burns, smoke inhalation,” Sherlock rumbles. “He’ll live.”

Greg closes his eyes. Not that he’d thought John would die, but he’d worried about serious complications.

“Carmine Cook’s been brought in for questioning. Seems Kenneth McDermott has some dirt on him. Cracked during questioning. Says Carmine thought himself the next Moriarty, had some inside information that’d...burn the heart of you, I suppose.” Sally relays to both of them.

Sherlock closes his eyes a moment before opening them again.  

“Detective Sergeant Donovan, I should like to speak with the detective inspector alone.” Greg opens his eyes to see Sherlock standing with his hands behind his back, his gaze trained on the detective sergeant with their usual insect-like appraisal.

Sally’s scowl deepens, but she stands. “I’ll wait outside, Greg.” She shoots him an inscrutable look, and walks out of the waiting room.

“I suppose you want to hear what happened,” Greg says. “Even if I already gave my statement to Donovan.”

“Yes, I do,” Sherlock’s vibrating with some kind of energy that Greg can’t place. His eyes flicker around the room as he swings his arms forward, clasping them once, releasing, and letting them drop at their sides. “Perhaps...we could...do it over...coffee.”

It’s half statement and half question. Greg tilts his head and his know his mouth is open but he is too arsed to care. “Coffee?”

“Yes.” Sherlock swallows and lowers his chin to his chest though his eyes remain locked on Greg’s. “Coffee.”

Greg leans back in his chair. “I’m too knackered for coffee right now, Sherlock. I’ve got to get some sleep.” He coughs.

“Did you get sufficient treatment?” Sherlock asks.

Greg blinks. Sherlock, always solicitous about the welfare of John Watson, has never asked about his own well-being. “Yeah.”

“Good.” Sherlock scuffs a shoe on the floor, his hands behind his back again. “It would please me, Greg, if you would join me for coffee tomorrow.”

The room tilts. Greg leans forward, knows his eyes are wide and his teeth are showing. “Why are you asking me this?”

Sherlock’s face twists. “Oh, forget it then. I didn’t know I would be subjecting myself to interrogation - “

Greg stands and grabs Sherlock’s hands, having now noticed the pinkening of the detective’s cheeks, and his sudden inability to hold eye contact. “Yes.” His heartbeat quickens. _But, why? What is this?_ “Sherlock, yes. I’d like - I’d like to spend more time with you.” He thinks about his earlier conversation with John. Has John said something?

“Wait, you called me by my name,” Greg says.

“It is customary to know the first name of a potential date.” Sherlock still won’t look at him.

_A date? Sherlock is asking me to a coffee date?_

“I’m not a kid anymore, Sherlock,” Greg says. “I don’t play games. If this is for a bloody case or experiment - “

“No case. No experiment.” Sherlock meets his eyes. “I just…” He clears his throat. “I thought you might be interested. Still.”

Greg is past cheeks flushing and heart skips. “I’m too fucking tired for this.”

Sherlock starts to withdraw and says, “John seemed to think - “

“What about John?” Greg asks. “Thought you were gone on him.”

“John is important to the work.” Sherlock moves a few feet away.

“The work is your life,” Greg says.

Sherlock looks up again. “Yes. You understand that.”

“Your work and my work are similar, Sherlock. One might say the work is the same, even if we approach it differently.”

Sherlock’s eyes narrow at this. But then relax again. “Yes. One might.”

Greg smiles. “Yes to coffee, Sherlock.”

Sherlock gives a sharp nod. “You’re not working tomorrow. Pick me up at 4 pm at Baker Street.” He snaps into a straight-backed stance.

“Good.” Greg’s chest flutters even as he stops himself from laughing at Sherlock's unorthodox way of arranging a date.

Sherlock is beaming. "Good." He leaves down the dimly lit hallway, and Greg thinks again of the Shadow Man he thought standing over the basement pit, helping him up.   
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
